Pinnacle College eNewsletter

18 November 2020

Newsletter Articles

Competition Winner

Congratulations to our Year 6 student Mia Belba who entered the Coles Little Treehouse ‘Create Your Own Book and Win’ Competition and won. Mia received a $1,000 Gift Card, a custom edition of a Treehouse book with an image of her on the cover. Mia also received a whopping ONE THOUSAND books for Pinnacle College. What an amazing achievement! Well done Mia!

Community Engagement Events at Golden Grove Campus

'Clothing and Book Drive'

During the Term 3 school holidays the 'Clothing and Book Drive' Event was hosted at the Australian Migrant Resource Centre. This event was organised by the Migrant Resource Centre, Pinnacle College and Australian Relief Organisation. Refugee Communities from Burma, Bhutan, Nepal, South Sudan and Syria attended the program and there were approximately 50 families present. We donated gift bags which contained clothing, books, chocolates and small rubber balls. Staff from Pinnacle College and AMRC mingled and chatted with the guests, we all enjoyed a light lunch together.

Cambodia Girls Dormitory Social Justice Project

We have got a new social justice project which we believe will be completed very quickly by your support. Could you give us a hand for our Cambodia Girls’ Dormitory Project?

GOAL: The successful and long-term operation of the boarding facility for orphans and disadvantaged young girls. This project will support all girls’, their everyday needs, as well as providing and supporting quality education from Junior to Senior high school.

SHORT TERM GOAL – Raising $20,000 for the set-up costs – Target end of 2020, beginning 2021.

LONG TERM GOAL – Continued sponsorship of the girls with monthly payments of $50-$100.

Thank you for your generous donations

Please see the flyer for details

Kind Regards,
Dr Mehmet Aslan
Community Engagement Manager

Community Engagement Events

PRIMARY COORDINATOR

As the end of 2020 dawns upon us, we can look back on the many successes and learning opportunities of our student cohort. They have worked hard and adapted to all the challenges faced in this unprecedented year. They have shown school values in their adversity to difficult situations; love and support towards their peers and community; courage in a changing learning landscape; and a can-do attitude!

Thank you to our parents who have worked in collaboration with us to minimise the impact to their child’s education and the swift return to mainstream learning. I believe both staff and parents have learnt a lot about each other and this will strengthen our relationships for the future. So much could not have been achieved without our parents’ support and flexibility.

Thank you to our staff for all their efforts. I have been most impressed by their actions to ensure students successfully complete much of their expected learning and in the recent weeks, to reinstate forms of learning in the wider community and to bring the community back into our school.

Finally, I would like to recognise our Year 6 class of 2020. It has been a pleasure to work with you all and to learn from you. At this time of writing our Graduation is nearing and I am pleased we are able to come together to celebrate their successes and the transition to high school.

I hope the summer break is one of rest, pleasure and some exciting adventures. We look forward to welcoming you back in 2021

Kind Regards,
Myles McLean

Primary Coordinator (Gilles Plains)

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

Remembrance Day was commemorated on 11th November 2020. The Year 1 class went through the significance of the day at assembly. It is a day to remember people who fought and died in wars. On that day in 1918 came the end of World War I with the Armistice with Germany. Students observed a minute silence and did some activities after assembly.

We also celebrated Music Count Us In, which is built around a unique program song. We sang the program song and we had some fun activities after that. We thank Mrs Sandra Holland for organising this program for our students.

We will be having the Primary Sports Day at Golden Grove in December and this will be another fun-filled activity. Our end of the year whole school excursion to Inflatable World will be on 8 November 2020. Please ensure you have given permission for both activities.

The new building that we purchased will be ready in January for classes to use. At the moment it is going through renovations and soon we will enjoy the Science / Art Room and there will be three new classrooms. There will also be an area for assembly and more play areas for our children.

No hat, no play. This is in line with our SunSmart policy, we require students to wear a Pinnacle College hat during outdoor play times in Term 4 and 1.

Please ensure you park your car in the carpark near the mosque and walk to the foyer to pick up and drop off your child. The staff car park is only for staff. When you drive into school, please exercise some patience and follow the speed limit in the car park.

Kind Regards,
Shalini Moss

School Noticeboard

Library

The library has been focusing on sports and games this term. Week 5 has been International Games week in the library with lots of library related games for all students. Week 6 will be the last week for students to borrow any books from our school library. It is important that all school library books are returned by Week 8. Please continue to read over the summer break, 20 minutes a day of reading increases your knowledge of words by 1.8 million over a year. Tea Tree Gully Library is a great place to borrow books and holds programs over the summer break. We are looking forward to moving into our new bigger, brighter library at Gilles Plains early next year. Feel free to email the library at library@pinnacle.sa.edu.au with any suggestions of books for the library.

Thank you for your continued enthusiasm and I would like to really THANK Tammy at Golden Grove for all the hard work she puts into the library.

Kind Regards,
Lisa Preston
Librarian at Golden
Grove and Gilles Plains

Library

Art Club

In the Art club this term Middle and Junior Primary students have been exploring the crayon resist techniques with crayon, pastels and watercolour. We have also been creating our own colourful keyrings from shrink plastic. The Senior Art Club has been experimenting with dyes, we have experimented with marbling and tie-dye.

Kind Regards,
Jocelyn Mungall

Art club

PASTORAL CARE

Pinnacle College alumni visited their former school and shared their high school experiences with year 8 and 9 students last week.

During lunch times in Week 5, the Year 9 students also started a peer support program. Peer support is an effective program which enhances the leadership capabilities of year 9 students while allowing junior students(year 4) to develop a sense of importance and appreciation. Furthermore, year 9 PC students were happy to start their sleepover program and are looking forward to having it again this week.

Kind Regards
Ayse Aslan & Gulsum Altunkopru
Girls Pastoral Care Teacher

Pastoral Care

MUSIC

Music - Gilles Plains

“Music is a piece of art that goes in the ears straight to the heart.”

This term is all about consolidating the music skills that have been learnt during the year to play as class ensembles – different parts on different instruments at the same time.

In Foundation, we have been learning to play different instruments at the appropriate time in a song called Edna The Elephant.

The Year 1s have been learning about improvising and played accompaniment parts to Living With The Rhythm on a variety of instruments.

In Year 2 we learnt to play six different ostinato patterns on six instruments, and then put them all together while keeping in time with the music.

The Year 3s and 4s combined their music skills by playing Mumma Warruno on the ukulele and adding percussion parts on djembe, tambours and tambourines to create an arrangement of the song. The challenge was to keep the music gentle and relatively quiet, as it is an Aboriginal lullaby.

Tracy Schache
Music Teacher

Music - Golden Grove

LOTE - Arabic

السلام عليكم و رحمة الله و بركاته

Welcome back to our final term of the year. I can’t believe we are almost at the end of the year.

Advanced Primary Students

The 3/4 Advanced Arabic class has been going over reading the texts from (learn Arabic book) and learning new vocabularies.

Past, present and command verbs were revisited as well as masculine and feminine forms of nouns. Students also learnt about possessive pronouns and vocabulary denoting possession.

Students have to create a poster about their plans for the summer holidays and present it as part of their speaking assessment.

Standard Secondary Students

As part of the Speaking assessment, students are preparing a PowerPoint presentation on aspects of their personal world, such as a timeline of growth and change or family celebrations of birthdays and other special occasions.

The students are continuing with their topics. The main focus is reading and translating texts provided in their textbook. Students are also introduced to grammatical concepts to sentence structures and the influence of grammar on orientation of text.

Warm Regards,
Soheir Habib
LOTE Teacher

LOTE Arabic

FOUNDATION – GOLDEN GROVE

We have had lots of fun and engaging lessons in the library with our Librarian Miss Lisa. We love listening to lots of beautiful stories both fiction and non-fiction. On one of our visits, Miss Lisa organised a team building activity, where students had to find their groups according to their colored blocks. The children then had to use all their blocks to build the tallest tower possible, at the end of the activity Miss Lisa measured all towers. The team with the tallest tower won.

Kindest Regards,
Mrs Vokolos

Foundation

YEAR 1 – GOLDEN GROVE

Within the Mathematic curriculum, students have particularly enjoyed learning about the value of Australian coins and notes. Students were able to practice identifying and recognising the value of different notes and coins by using money in different shopping experiences and working together to find the change needed. This consolidated their understanding of addition and subtraction. When taking your child shopping, this would be an excellent learning opportunity for students to connect what they are learning in class to a real life context.

Kindest Regards,
Miss Di Cola

Year 1

YEAR 2 - GOLDEN GROVE

Hi parents!

‘The Water Cycle...takes the water and moves it UP and DOWN and all around the Earth!’ I am sure this song has been stuck in your head for the last few weeks as it has mine! The students have been very enthusiastic about learning the song about the Water Cycle in our Science Lessons! They even performed it in Assembly! The Water Cycle has been a great topic introducing children to scientific vocabulary such as Precipitation, Condensation, Evaporation, Collection, Ground Water, Desalination plants, Dams, Reservoirs and further expanding their knowledge about how the world works. Their 3D models looked amazing! Thanks for your help!

Kindest Regards,
Mrs Rees

Year 2

YEAR 3 – GOLDEN GROVE

Living Sustainably - Technology

In Technology we have been making sustainable villages, while learning how to protect the environment. In our villages we included things that are safe for the environment, such as solar panels, rivers/irrigation, veggie patches and vehicles that do not use petrol. We planned for different types of renewable energy sources like solar and wind energy. First, we created a blueprint plan so we could make our sustainable villages easily. Our sustainable villages had to be made of reusable or recyclable things such as cardboard, popsicle sticks, packing peanuts and paper.

By Daya S. and Zeina A.

Year 3

YEAR 4 – GOLDEN GROVE

The Year 4s have been trying to improve their teamwork by collaborating with different peers in English and Maths. We formed ‘teams’ while learning about Multiplication and Chance, and supported each other as ‘mini teachers’ throughout the learning process. Team work makes the dream work!

Take care,
Miss Mubarak

Year 4

YEAR 5 – GOLDEN GROVE

The Year 5s have spent the past 4 weeks working in groups to rehearse and perform The Basketball Rap with hip hop dance moves. Their performances were particularly impressive and very entertaining!

Kind Regards,
Year 5 Teachers

Year 5

YEAR 7– GOLDEN GROVE

Athletics Day!

During week 1 all high school students participated in our annual Sports Day. Congratulations to Gilbert for winning the overall Athletics Trophy and Torrens who were our overall spirit champions. Also congratulations to our individual winners Zakia and Xieheerding, runners up; Aeman and Ahmad Hamada and 3rd place winners; Nada Hadarra, Asraa and Aydin. Thank you to all those who contributed to and helped out on the day. Well done everyone!

Life Education

In Week 5, students participated in several fun activities in the Life Education bus. This was a great way to reiterate what the Year 7’s have been learning in health!

Kind regards,
Miss Molly Affolter and Mrs Mungall
Year 7 Teachers

Year 7

YEAR 8 & 9 – GOLDEN GROVE

Athletics Day!

HPE Beach Volleyball

On 30th October Pinnacle students participated in the Northern Zone 8/9 Girls Beach Volleyball competition. Congratulations to the Div 1 team who finished 3rd in their division and the Div 2 team who finished 8th. Team spirit was high even against the tough opposition of Paralowie, Salisbury East and St Columba High Schools. A great day for all! Well done girls!

Debating

On Wednesday Week 4, six year 9 girls participated in a national YouDebate competition held over Zoom. Hani, Sunia and Khadicha won their round showing excellent speaking and rebutting skills, and Asheena, Sabrin and Fatimah participated enthusiastically. Well done to all!

Science

Year 8 and 9 students explored conversation of energy,energy transfers and changes and forms of energy through the engaging, fascinating and fun curriculum-rich science incursion last week at Pinnacle, Golden Grove Campus. Thank you mobile science education for visiting us.

Year 9 students conducted an experiment to build an electro-chemical battery with the lemons. This experiment is a fun way to explore how electricity works.

Kind regards,
Year 9 Teachers

Year 8 & 9

FOUNDATION – GILLES PLAINS

Our Foundation students got to experience attending one of their first big special assemblies as part of Music Count Us In. Students not only enjoyed singing in unison with all classes, but were also taught some sign language, had a ball at participating in various songs and rested with a Teddy Bears’ Picnic.

Kind Regards
Miss Victoria Makowiak

Foundation - Gilles Plains

YEAR 1 – GILLES PLAINS

This term, Year 1 students have been learning all about persuasive writing. They enjoyed thinking of some strong words they could use when trying to convince someone to agree with their own opinion. They also came up with some excellent ideas on why a dog, rabbit, fish, or cat would make the best pet.

Kind regards,
Mrs Sandra Holland

YEAR 2 – GILLES PLAINS

In Term 4, the Year 2 students have thoroughly enjoyed their weekly library visits with Mrs Preston. We have listened to a range of stories based on popular sports in preparation for the Pinnacle College Junior Primary Sports Day. We have also enjoyed playing games designed by Mrs Preston to celebrate International Games Week. The purpose of this event is for libraries to introduce some new and exciting activities and raise awareness of the social and educational benefits of play.

Warm regards
Miss Bianca Villani

Gilles Plains

YEAR 3 & 4 – GILLES PLAINS

Students in year 3 and 4 have been enjoying learning some new and exciting dance moves as a part of our Dance curriculum for The Arts.

As each week progresses, the students are learning new dance sequences and movement patterns. They are also enjoying developing their coordination and cannot wait to perform the routine to their peers at the end of our 8-week block.

Kind Regards,
Mrs Moss and Miss Kerry